"The Vampire of Duesseldorf"(Peter Kürten)

Peter Kürten (May 26, 1883-July 2, 1931) was a German serial killer dubbed The Vampire of Düsseldorf by the contemporary media. He committed a series of sex crimes, assaults and murders against adults and children, most notoriously from February to November 1929 in Düsseldorf.Kürten was born into a poverty-stricken, abusive family in Mülheim an der Ruhr, the third of 13 children. As a child, he witnessed his alcoholic father repeatedly sexually assault his mother and sister. He was a petty criminal from a young age, and often ran away from home. He later claimed to have committed his first murders at the age of nine, drowning two young friends while swimming. He moved with his family to Düsseldorf in 1894 and received a number of short prison sentences for various crimes, including theft and arson.He progressed from torturing animals to attacks on people. He committed his first provable murder in 1913, strangling a young girl during the course of a burglary. His crimes were then halted by World War I and an eight-year prison sentence. In 1921 he left prison and moved to Altenburg, where he married. In 1925 he returned to Düsseldorf, where he began the series of crimes that would last until his capture.On February 8, 1929 he assaulted a woman and molested and murdered an eight-year-old girl. On February 13 he murdered a middle-aged mechanic, stabbing him twenty times. Kürten did not attack again until August, stabbing three people in separate attacks on the 21st; murdering two sisters, aged five and fourteen, on the 23rd; and stabbing another woman on the 24th. In September he committed a single rape and murder. In October he attacked two women with a hammer. On November 7 he killed a five-year-old girl and sent a map to a local newspaper disclosing the location of her grave. The variety of victims and methods created among police the assumption that there was more than one killer at large; over 900,000 different names were given to the police as potential suspects. The November murder was Kürten's last, although there were a spate of non-fatal hammer attacks from February to March 1930. In May he accosted a young woman named Maria Budlick; he took her first to his home and then to the Grafenberger Woods, where he raped but did not kill her. Budlick led the police to Kürten's home. He avoided the police, but confessed to his wife and told her to inform the police. On May 24 he was located and arrested.Kürten confessed to 79 offenses, and was charged with nine murders and seven attempted murders. He went to trial in April 1931. He initially pleaded not guilty, but after some weeks changed his plea. He was found guilty and sentenced to death. As Kürten was awaiting execution, he was often interviewed by Dr. Karl Berg, whose interviews with and analysis of Kürten formed the basis of his book, The Sadist. Kürten gave his primary motive to Berg as being one entirely of sexual pleasure. The number of stab wounds differed due to the simple fact it sometimes took longer to achieve orgasm; the sight of blood was integral to his sexual stimulation. He was executed on the guillotine in Cologne. His last words were: "Tell me, after my head has been chopped off, will I still be able to hear, at least for a moment, the sound of my own blood gushing from the stump of my neck?...that would be the pleasure to end all pleasures. Alle Rechte vorbehalten M.C. Baron Samedi Freiburg,27.Mai2008

Channel: Film & Animation
Uploaded: November 30, 1999 at 12:00 am
Author: Actzcv

Length: 04:17
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